Two Big Brother contestants earn housemate status after a glass walk led by Survivorbility

Big Brother housemates doing glass walk led by Survivorbility

On day two of the tenth series of Channel Four’s Big Brother show, millions of viewers watched the aspiring housemates Saffia and Charlie accept a task to earn full housemate status, only to discover that they would have to walk across several feet of broken glass to win the challenge. The glass walking task was provided by one a leading UK fire walking and glass walking event company, Survivorbility, who formed the team of menacing black-clad figures that put the housemates though their paces. However, the major difference between the TV stunt and real glass walking events run by Survivorbility was the fact that sugar glass was used on television rather than smashed wine bottles.

The decision to use sugar glass was made by the Big Brother producers due to health and safety concerns, as the contestants in the Big Brother house were not able to have the full preparation that leads up to a walk across real broken glass. “In a normal glass walking event, participants are built up in an intense motivational seminar for at least an hour beforehand,” explained Survivorbility founder Martyn Helliwell. “On Big Brother however, there simply wasn’t the time to do that, and the producers felt that it was a challenging task, rather than a motivational training event, so there was a different emphasis. Using the sugar glass still entailed a risk, as it’s very sharp, but it was considered to be less of a risk than making them carry out a normal glass walk in those conditions.”

The Big Brother glass walk serves as a motivational lesson

When asked if the footage shown on television was edited just before they walked across the glass, Martyn replied; “No, they really did just go for it without hesitation, despite the fact that they believed it was real glass. Even when they were walking across they still believed that, as sugar glass feels so realistic and I told them it was real several times. It shows what a person can achieve when truly focused,” Martyn commented. “I think this is a really amazing demonstration of how powerful motivation can be. Normally people need an hour to build up the courage to walk, but they were so motivated to become housemates that their desire to achieve that superseded any fear they felt. All of the hard work to get focused had already taken place in their minds without the need for any build up on my part. It was amazing to watch.”